Kathryn Julian
Assistant Professor, History
Kathryn Julian
She/Her/Hers
Full-Time FacultyAssistant Professor
History
Phone: 801.832.2753
Email: kjulian@westminsteru.edu
Office Location: Foster Hall 211
Office Hours: TTh 11:00AM 12:00PM,MW 04:00PM 05:00PM
Degrees
Ph.D. University of Massachusettes Amherst
M.A. The University of Tennessee
B.A. Birmingham-Southern College
About
I grew up in Fort Worth, Texas and Birmingham, Alabama and have since lived and worked in a variety of places from Germany to Hungary to Massachusetts, where I received my Ph.D. in History in 2017 from UMass Amherst and worked at the DEFA Film Library. I joined the Westminster community in 2020 after two years at Maryville College in East TN. When I'm not teaching or writing, I'm likely on the trails or spending time with my two greedy cats.
Interests
My goal is to help students develop a greater awareness of how historical processes
and ideas shaped issues facing present-day society. My courses incorporate a diversity
of perspectives to contextualize the experiences of people in the past. I teach a
range of classes, including Film and Memory, Comparative Revolutions, Death on Display,
Supernatural Europe, Truth and Reconciliation, Culture and Society in East Asia, Global
Coffee Cultures, History of the Holocaust, Patterns of Immigration, and Global Cold
War, that connect global topics to our local communities. Students are encouraged
to create digital projects, visit local sites, and conduct interviews to understand
how historical memory affects us today.
My own research focuses on comparative memory, the ecology of sacred space, and popular
religious belief within socialist modernity. My current book project, Convents and
Cadres: Catholic Sisters and Popular Piety in East Germany investigates how Roman
Catholics recovered from the trauma of the Second World War and contributed to society
in the socialist German Democratic Republic. I'm also deeply interested in the intersection
of history and justice and how collective memory affects reconciliation efforts.
Areas of Expertise
Memory cultures, history of religion, Central Europe, gender, public and digital history, film, truth and reconciliation, East Asia
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